Eisa

Eisa is the group performance tradition of Okinawa associated with the Obon period in summer, in which young people from each district march in formation playing the small handheld paranku drum, the larger shimedaiko and odaiko drums, and accompanied by sanshin players and singers. The repertoire draws on Okinawan folk songs in the local Ryukyuan languages, with characteristic dance moves that include the chondara (clown figures) who mock and exaggerate the moves of the serious performers. Tempos range from stately processional to brisk dance.

Eisa is traditionally associated with the Buddhist Obon ritual of welcoming returning ancestor spirits, but in modern Okinawa it has become both a community practice and a competitive performance form. The annual Okinawa Zento Eisa Matsuri festival, held since 1956, brings district groups together in a competition format. Eisa was carried by Okinawan emigrants to Hawaii, California, Peru and Brazil, where diaspora eisa groups maintain the tradition.

The paranku is a small frame drum held in one hand and struck with a stick — its tight, high sound cuts through the texture. The larger odaiko provides the bass pulse. Listen for the moment a sanshin section enters playing one of the traditional Okinawan tunes (Eisa-related songs include Hiyamikachi-bushi and others), with the drums dropping to a quieter accompaniment.

Recordings of the Okinawa Zento Eisa Matsuri performances, available through Okinawan municipal cultural offices, capture the live-festival form. For studio recordings, the Sonayama Seinen-kai group's releases on the Campus Records label are reliable.

Eisa is one of the few Japanese folk traditions that crossed the Pacific intact via twentieth-century emigration — eisa groups in Hawaii, Lima and São Paulo maintain not just the dances but specific district affiliations back to particular Okinawan villages.